FIRST, a Reuters/Zogby poll finds that one in four Americans think they will
be poorer in the next four years. That sounds like a stock-market "buy"
signal to me.

Second, and more interesting, USA Today just published President George W.
Bush's investment portfolio - managed in a blind trust since 1995 (when he
was elected governor of Texas) by Northern Trust. He has half his assets
stashed in U.S. Treasury notes and somewhere between one-eighth and
one-sixth in stocks and stock mutual funds. The rest is in real estate, cash
and private partnerships. Bush's total net worth is somewhere between $11
million and $29 million (reporting requirements account for the vagueness).

What intrigue me are the stock holdings. Northern Trust has put Bush into 39
stocks, but just seven of them are technology and telecom firms, and all of
those are large ones.

There's no telling, of course, whether Bush continues to hold these stocks
in his blind trust, but, if he does, all of them seem to have benefited from
his accession to the presidency.

Let's hope Northern Trust did not lose faith in technology, like so many
nay-saying pundits in the financial press. The shakeout of the past year
has, on the whole, been healthy. It is not beneficial for an economy to have
capital directed blithely to firms with little chance of making money. Now,
many of those companies are being acquired or going bankrupt. The firms that
are left will be stronger.

Lately, I have been drawn to two types of tech firms: the large ones, like
those in Bush's portfolio, and smaller, riskier companies that are either
making profits or are on the verge - robust businesses whose stocks have
been dragged down indiscriminately.

One example in the b-to-b sector is Commerce One, whose software helps
companies buy and sell. The stock went public in July 1999 at $3.50 and
peaked at $137 in March last year, then collapsed. After surging last week
on news of strong sales, it's at $28. Another is Siebel Systems, Inc. (which
I own), a maker of Internet-based software, which, among other things,
supports corporate sales forces. Siebel, too, has fallen from its high, but
not nearly as much. The company has been profitable for years, and, over the
past 12 months, earned $200 million on $1.5 billion in revenues (profits
were up 65 percent over the previous year).

But it is the b-to-c sector that has been most neglected. At these prices, I
am a fan of Amazon, down 80 percent from its high and consolidated its
position at the top e-retailer as competitors throw in the towel, and
Yahoo!, which has emerged as the dominant worldwide portal and whose stock I
have been buying lately. Amazon still loses money while Yahoo makes a decent
profit - though its P/E remains astronomical.

Even more interesting, however, are two superb b-to-c firms whose stocks
have been clobbered: DoubleClick, which provides media and marketing
services to firms that advertise on the Web, and eBay, the online
auctioneer.

DoubleClick, which is well stocked with cash, still has not made a profit
and is suffering from the Internet advertising debacle - but, again, it is a
company that will benefit from the demise of competitors. Its stock fell
from a high of $135 to below $10 at the start of the year. In recent weeks,
it's rallied to $15 - still, to my mind, cheap for long-term investors who
can tolerate the risk. EBay, which peaked at $127 in March and fell to
$26.50 in December, has also surged, nearly doubling. EBay has been
profitable since 1997; revenues have been doubling annually, earnings
tripling.

The problem for both DoubleClick and eBay is political. Government
intervention to assuage privacy concerns would hurt these companies. Let's
hope that President Bush, just inaugurated Saturday, will allow consumers to
make their own choices and allow firms like these to thrive. If not, perhaps
consumers will be poorer a year from
now.